Peace In Our Time
by Hawki
Summary: Beast Morphers Oneshot: The Mighty Morphin Rangers hadn't been the first ranger team to protect Earth, but they were the first to be remembered. But year after year, one threat after another, one team after another...from the outside looking in, Jason saw the truth. It would never end. Even if he joined the fight himself again.


**Peace in Our Time**

Even now, Jason Lee Scott remembers the Switzerland peace conference.

In hindsight, it seems ridiculous. Take some teenagers from Angel Grove, California, and send them across the pond to a country they've never been to, to discuss issues that they're barely qualified to comment on. Especially him. He was a decent student. He made money on the side teaching karate at the Youth Centre. Not too bad a resume to run his own dojo, but by no means sound qualifications to try and bring conflict to the world to an end.

It was ridiculous then. Now, in hindsight, it's even more ridiculous.

He can look back on his time there as the last gasp of an old world. Once, before Rita Repulsa, mankind's greatest threat was itself. People still fought each other. Killed each other. That remained true even with the ranger teams before them. But then, one day in summer, 1993, his life changed. The world changed. Power rangers returned to the world, following orders from a space wizard in a stasis tube, where victory or defeat would be decided on how well they used their fists, and on occasion, their weapons. And almost always, secure final victory by using dinosaurs (not that the tetradactyl, sabretooth tiger, and woolly mammoth are actually dinosaurs, but whatever) to form a giant space samurai, and use a giant sword, to slay giant monsters. Usually with no small amount of collateral damage in the process.

And he loved it. The quiet pride in knowing that he'd saved the world. Listening to his fellow teens speculate as to the rangers' identities. And above all, the thrill of battle itself. Monday to Friday, regular as a cartoon, Rita would threaten Angel Grove and the world, and the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers would stop her. He thought it would last forever. And to his silent shame, part of him wanted it to. Then came the conference, then came a new red, black, and yellow ranger, and then came the death of the old world, and the start of a new.

There's no reason to hold peace conferences when mankind's greatest threat isn't itself anymore. There are no conferences to be held with the likes of space wizards, demons, mutants, and monsters.

He did return eventually. Jason Lee Scott. Gold Zeo Ranger…mostly wearing black, but hey, semantics. But it didn't matter. New ranger. New threat. More battles, and above all, more power. He could feel it, every time he tapped into the Morphing Grid. He could feel it, every time the gold and black armour covered his body. Power. Lots of power. More power than he dreamed possible as the red ranger. Power eventually given up for "turbo power" by Tommy and the others, and power that he never sampled. Not that he spends too much time worrying about that. The Command Centre was destroyed. Turbo power went the way of geared cars. And then the near end of the world. The Space Rangers. The Z-Wave. He fought, he bled, he saw people die, and then, he saw a wave of light consume the world and the universe. Zordon's last act. Self-sacrifice, to eradicate evil for good. A sacrifice that, as it turned out, didn't even last a year, as more threats arose. At first, beyond Earth, according to transmissions from _Terra Venture_, but after that, new evils. Old evils. Evil, evil, and more evil. Evil fought by different ranger teams, year after year. Reminding him, as he made his way through the world, that Zordon's sacrifice had been for nothing. Maybe, at best, he had saved Earth. But he hadn't ended anything. Nothing has. Two decades since the death of Zordon, and the world's been burning. The towns differ. The rangers differ. But the cycle continues. And from what he's learnt, it's a cycle that'll keep on at least until the year 3000.

Or not. Aliens were meant to be on Earth by 2025. So far, no aliens. Maybe the future's in a constant state of flux.

He had his fun, of course. The moon. Serpentera. One yell of "forever red," before riding off into the desert. And one last hurrah in a grand battle for the fate of the planet, with every ranger team ever. One battle that, like all such battles, ended nothing. No words exchanged from Jason Lee Scott then, because he's realized that words are but dust in the wind – seen, but irrelevant. Enemies keep coming. Rangers keep forming. His only hope now is that his Earth doesn't meet the same fate as the dimension the RPM Rangers came from. Because that's what it means for evil to win, and it means the death of everything.

So now he's here. 36 years old. Drifting from town to town, making a living from odd jobs. His bones ache. His spirit is numb. Over two decades since he became a power ranger, and what does he have to show for it? What reason is there for the Beast Rangers to need him? What now, he reflects, as the rangers of this generation join the fight? He's not even sure why he's here. The world will never forget the name of Tommy Oliver. But it quickly forgot the name of Jason Lee Scott. Green with envy? Perhaps. But he's tired now. So tired that he cannot turn red from rage.

Still, it's come to this. New team. Old ranger. Another battle. There's always another battle. So he stands tall, under the light of a sun even older than he. He holds his morpher in his hands, bearing the sigil of a long extinct creature, and one that he feels just as ancient as. One day, his bones too will re-join the Earth. One day, he's going to die, and do so in the knowledge that he's just a link in the chain.

But not today. To death, he says, not today. So, in a motion he mastered all those years ago, he repeats the words. Words lived by. Words that one day, he knows he'll die by.

"It's morphing time."

Red armour clads his body. Red fury returns. And today, in battle, red blood shall run no more. For this is the way of the world now. This is the way of _his _world.

In this world, it's all he can do.

In this world, it's all he has left.

* * *

_A/N_

_So, obviously however Jason's appearance in _Beast Morphers _goes, it isn't going to be like this, but meh, drabbled this up. _

_Honestly, I'm kind of surprised that a "legacy ranger" is featuring that isn't Tommy for once. 0_0_


End file.
